I am looking to buy a set of grips for a S&W. I am being told I need 50 posts, and I only have 12 posts so far. Shall I make 38 stupid contributions, or just forget this forum?

If your purpose of joining this forum was to get access to the classified section, you're going to be sorrily disappointed. This forum is a discussion forum first and foremost. The classifieds serve only a secondary function at best. If you want to shop I suggest Google, Gunbroker, or eBay.

The 50 post limit was imposed to stop "Drive By Postings" (people who join just for the purpose of placing an ad) as well as allowing the members here to get to know and develop trust with the buyer or seller. As we are not eBay, we have no seller ratings, so this is one way to protect the members from being scammed.

As to making stupid contributions just to gain access to the classifieds, when people make statements like that, they pop up on my radar. Repeated posts of "+1" or "I agree" get deleted and your count goes down and you wil get warned. Continuing the practice will get you banned. So I'd avoid that tactic.

Finally, if you read the forum guidelines, http://www.handgunforum.net/misc.php...rum_guidelines, you should have read this:"The forum is an inappropriate venue for publicly discussing any problems you may have with the rules or the administration of the forum." If you don't like a rule, open forum is not the place to vent it.